
Book.__IUlMSi 



COCVRIGHT DEPOSITS 



Poems appearing in this volume have 
been previously published in The 
Trimmed Lamp; Youth, a Magazine of 
Verse; Poetry; Contemporary Verse; 
and The Midland. 



Poems appearing in this volume have 
been previously published in The 
Trimmed Lamp; Youth, a Magazine of 
Verse; Poetry; Contemporary Verse; 
and The Midland. 



ROUGH TRAILS AND 
SILVER MEADOWS 



BY 
LEYLAND HUCKFIELD 



THE MIDLAND PRESS 

GLENNIE, ALCONA COUNTY 

MICHIGAN 









-^"^^ 



COPYRIGHT 1922 
BY LEYLAND HUCKFIELD 



C1A6SS435 



FES 23 im 



-VVflf 



CONTENTS 

MID-WESTERN 

Riding West 1 

Death-Song of the Mad God Who Made the Grand Canyon 2 

Break-Up in the South Saskatchewan .... 4 

The Coffer-Dam Crew 5 

North — North — North 6 

Spell of the River 8 

The Ford at Saskatoon 10 

Off Catalina 12 

The Sons of Dan 14 

The Ballad of a Walking Boss 16 

ENGLISH 

Avon Memories ' ... 21 

The Laborer in the Mists 24 

An April Night 26 

Haunted Reaping 28 

Oh, For a Dark Green Hill-Top 30 

The Tramp Girl 31 

Last Load Home 36 

Oil of Man 38 

The Land of Plums 40 

The Carol Singers 43 

NIGHT MOODS 

The Old Gods March 49 

Passing of the Mad Singers 50 

A Midnight Song 51 

A Winter Gale 52 

The Bogging of Death 54 

The Singing Skull 56 



Vll 



A Song op Dark Hours 59 

The Gales op Autumn 61 

Fleets of Doom 62 

Lure op Light 64 

DAWN-LIGHT 

When You Have Dreamed Your Dream 67 

Ceramics 68 

A Gardener to a Potter 69 

The Smithy Above the Moon 70 

To a Parakeet 71 

Birds That Cleave the Shadows 72 

When I Lay Down My Craftsman Tools .... 74 

The Muse in Church 75 

In January Fog 76 

There Is a Garden in My Brain 77 



vm 



MID-WESTERN 



XI 



RIDING WEST 

Half a score of us were roaring a drinking song 
With the iron-wheeled scrapers clanking a mad refrain, 
And ever the trampled ground gave back that din of 

sound, 
Flinging it into the dusty air again 
Like an echo of agony throbbing on and on. 
For we were riding West where never a wheel had gone 
And where never the ghost of a trail had ever lain. 

We loomed against a flaming Autumn sky 

As we swung steadily over a prairie swell 

On through clouds of hoof-tossed alkali 

That stung like evil dust from the trails of Hell : 

Back behind us we heard the teamsters yell, 

Heard the creaking of tugs and the ringing of chains 

And saw the loaded wagons lurching along. 

We felt the cool night wind and the prairie weeds waved 

slowly 
And the flame of the sun went down as the breeze arose, 
And now we rode through a world that was weirdly holy 
Where the song and the curses came to a lifeless close : 

Only the clanking and ringing of iron things 
Never ended but mocked at the darkening land, 
Clanging a strident tune that all could understand — 
A prophecy of multitudes tramping behind a plow — 

Over to the south of us we heard a rushing of wings 
And saw the dim triangles of wild geese beating away 
To waters farther west, blood-red with the dying glow : 

And our pounding hoofs boomed doom to the solitudes 
As the grading outfit swung by rise and hollow ; 
A ragged, a vermined crew, hardened of heart and thew. 
Steadily riding West — with the rest of the world to 
follow. 



DEATH-SONG OF THE MAD GOD WHO MADE 
THE GRAND CANYON 

Oh ! I am the god who so mightily trod — 
Trampled Chaos and tore it asunder, 
Rose from the mire and the mists and the fire 
Reeking with heat and throbbing with thunder ; 
Who drank the blood of the league-long things 
That came to bathe in the boiling springs ; 
To whom as a thorn was the dinosaur's horn; 
I, who was born in the scalding gloom 
And flung from the terrible flaming womb 
Of the Mother of Doom — down under. 

I ravaged the world and the rocks I hurled 

Broke gold from the sun in showers, 

And I hated the moon so I murdered it soon — 

The moon with its damnable flowers — 

The flesh of Earth's herds made gargantuan feasts, 

For ever I harried the mightier beasts ; 

Roaring and raving, wandering, I 

Swore that their bones in the rocks and rivers 

Of Earth forever should lie. 

Where the valleys were lit with flames of the pit 

I trampled the carcases gory, 

I lurched and I swung till the madness I sung 

Broke my heart with its passion and glory ; 

But I roared till the night was a-quiver with fright 

And I vowed I would die, as I 'd lived, in my might ; 

So I broke from the mountains their pinnacled walls 

And tossed them to Hell with wild, bellowing bawls ; 

And the devils came up through the fire and the smother, 

Dancing in flame and chasing each other ; 

Oh ! all the devils in Hell were by 

To see the Mad God mightily die 

Who was born of the Old Mad Mother. 



DEATH-SONG OF THE MAD GOD WHO MADE THE GRAND CANYON 

From each blazing bog, through the blood-red fog, 

From my bottomless caves of plunder, 

The gold I hauled and the flesh I mauled 

And piled them in horrible wonder ; 

I mixed them together, I piled them high 

From the floor of Hell to the roof of the Sky; 

Roaring and howling, happily I 

Made out of chaos a Thing that never — 

Never — never can die. 



BREAK-UP IN THE SOUTH 
SASKATCHEWAN 

The morning came in crocus flame above the prairie 's rim, 
Though all about our blackened shacks the shadows still 

were grim, 
And with the day, from far away, a grinding roar began 
That shook the earth till from each berth leapt forth a 

cursing man, 
And we raised a mighty shout, for the ice was going out 
And hell was breaking loose in the South Saskatchewan. 

The great floes clung and smashed and swung and charged 
on either shore. 

They were as creatures of the deep unseen by man before, 

They tossed and broke in splinter-smoke, they heaved and 
ripped and ran. 

It seemed as though the dawn had chanced upon the weir- 
wolf clan — 

As though vast wolves and fierce white bears went 
through Saskatchewan. 

They gnashed and crept, they writhed and leapt with 
dripping jaws thrown high, 

Till crashing thunders rocked the bluffs and split the 
morning sky, 

In frightful ranks they gored the banks and surging fast 
began 

A grinding, growling, roaring rout behind their awful van 

Of horrors white that clawed the spine of cowed Saskat- 
chewan. 



THE COFFER-DAM CEEW 

Fifty below, and an hour to dawn ; 

Three black-beamed derricks, stark and hard, 

Lean above us and bar the sky : 

We are the night-gang, the coffer-dam crew, 
Picking and pounding as devils do. 
Scraping forty feet down under 
The whirring derricks' rattle and thunder, 
And far down under the river too. 

Dignity of toil? Be damned! 
Muscles stiff with the creeping cold ; 
Heavy picks in rock-jarred hands. 
And the shift a hundred ages old : 
Noses blistered down to the bone, 
Cheek-bones raw from a rubbing mitt — 
Here's where the wheezing boozers groan, 
Down on the dead-line of human grit. 

Steady hiss of the engine steam. 

Chunk and thing of a ceaseless pump ; 

We are the souls in Hell 's extreme — 

Stick to the job, or starve — thump — thump. 

Thirty minutes to seven o 'clock, 

Fires of endurance nearly dead, 

Pick — pick — pick — at the ice and rock. 

The foreman — Fate — scowls overhead. 

The day gang's here: We seek our lair — 
And it's sixty below, as the dawnlight shows 
At the rickety shanty a mile up-shore — 
Oh ! grinding god of the grim white snows. 
What the devil d'ye think we care? 
Give us coffee and let us snore. 



NORTH — NORTH — NORTH 

North — north — north — 

Plunging towards the Pole ; 

The horses pound and the oxen plod 

And the tin-horn crooks and men of God 

Are all on the muster roll. 

There's sound of the usual things 
That lie in a wagon bed ; 
Iron that chinks and rings 
Like broken chains of the dead; 
And clatter of household tins, 
And tinkle of hidden glass, 
And feet as heavy as lead 
Tramping the prairie grass: 

And lean, white-bearded men 

Stiff with their years and sins, 

Chew and mumble, and mumble and chew, 

And rumble tales as they always do 

When the sap of manhood thins. 

'Forty crowded years ago 
Up from Iowa they came; 
Young and lank and bullock-strong, 
And ripped the tough Dakota plain 
With bellowed curse and crack of thong: 
Upsprung the rustling lakes of grain. 
Its promise changed to flame of gold, 
But ease was cursed until they sold 
And faced the Northern trail again.' 

North — north — north — 
Into Saskatchewan; 
Eolling over the Border Line, 
Baggage and beast and man: 
Rolling up on the Old Bone Trail 
In the wake of the buffalo — 
Grim-eyed men in the power of prime 
Plunging into the snow. 



NORTH NORTH NORTH 

North to the site of Medicine Hat 
To build them a flimsy town ; 
To hammer it up in the freezing Fall 
And next year hammer it down : 
On in front of the grading crews ; 
On while the land was young — 
Night and day on a wagon box 
With a star at the end of the tongue. 

North — north — north — 
Under the sun and moon 
I saw them raising the shacks and tents 
Of an early Saskatoon: 
Hammering mightily, breeding there, 
Breaking the sod and seeding there, 
And ever with gamblers' eyes 
Peering afar for a fateful star 
That hangs in the Northern skies. 

North — north — north — 

They were going, and still they go; 

They are breaking the far Peace River lands 

Where it's seventy-five below — 

Where it's seventy-five below 

In the Borealis glare, 

They have broken the sod, and by grace of God 

The wheat is greening there. 

North — north — north — 

Far up in McKenzieland, 

There may be a plot where the soil is hot 

And a crop of grain may stand ; 

And the lean old men with creaking bones 

Will out of their chairs and go, 

Buckle traces to blind old teams 

And head them into the snow — 

Into the heart of a lonely land 

That leads to the lifeless Pole, 

As long as a weary foot may stand 

Or a creaking wheel may roll. 



SPELL OF THE RIVER 

When you have dreamed for a night by the mighty Mis- 
sissippi 

Take up the wanderer's bundle and lock the homestead 
door; 

Open the gates of the pasture and let the beasts go free 

And turn your feet to the river road that leads to the 
heaving sea, 

For you have done with the valley farm for ever and 
evermore. 

You are thrall to the river, the slave of his rolling flood ; 
Bound to his glistening silver breast and chained to a 

flashing blade. 
For the croon of his midnight music has drifted into your 

blood, 
And the surge of his soul has drowned your soul as 

though it had never been made. 

Dip your paddle, or swing your oar, or hoist a canvas 

sheet ; 
North to the blue St. Croix or south to the flats of New 

Orleans ; 
Nothing will ever be half so fair as what lies on before, 
Be it the Falls of St. Anthony or the old Missouri shore 
Or banks where summer blossoms blow till all the river is 

sweet. 

Spring, with the tassels dropping fast from leaning wil- 
low sprays, 

Silver lights and silver rains and fleece-flocked April 
skies ; 

Silence of swooning summer nights in shadow-haunted 
bays 

And days when red October's gold upon the water lies. 



SPELL OF THE BIVER 

Had you song? What need of a song when Mississippi 

sings ? 
Thunder thrilling his tawny deeps, his shallows trilling 

refrain — 
Love of beauty and peace that fled with coming of evil 

tilings ? 
Turn to the river and beauty and peace shall enter your 

lives again. 

Would you solve the spell of the River? — Go learn the 

drag of the sea 
That calls to the salty blood of men since ever a keel was 

laid — 
But — set your feet to the river road and the end of the 

tale shall be 
That the surge of his soul engulfed your soul as though it 

had never been made. 



THE FORD AT SASKATOON 

The edge of the world lay hid in purple haze 
When we came down to the ford at Saskatoon, 
But the tops of the poplar bluffs were all ablaze 
With a deepening orange glow that lit the river below, 
For the stars were huddling back from a giant moon. 

The creak of the wagon poles was blasphemy from hell 

Tearing the dreaming winds of a new found land. 

And the clinking, rusty chains were fetters of unknown 

dead 
Tramping beside the wagons on either hand : 
It almost seemed as though the slushers were clanking a 

knell 
As we came down to the ford at Saskatoon — 
It almost seemed as though we heard a tuneless bell 
Tolling beneath the darkness under the moon. 

Somewhere back on the trail a straw-boss cursed us ail 
With the thin hyaena whine of a weak-willed fool ; 
We heard the sucking feet of a hundred teams 
Descending steadily in unending line — 
And then the arching boughs of the willows immersed us 

all 
In the gloom of a haunted mine 
Beflecked with scattering beams. 



10 



THE FORD AT SASKATOON" 

And SO we came to the ford at Saskatoon 
And marked the light in a shack on the farther shore, 
And heard Saskatchewan with her hungry croon 
And put our foremost team at the swirling flood — 

And now, whenever we map the river, we draw it in blood, 
And that is the true tint of the South Saskatchewan ; 
For we can hear the cries of the drowned men evermore, 
We can hear the rusty chains clinking under the moon. 
And shiver with dread of a treacherous trap as when we 

stood 
Peering for Death by the ford at Saskatoon. 



11 



OFF CATALINA 

On this enchanted tide 
I pray my soul may ride 
When the long life-day is done, 
Then will I wanton wide 
Among the purple hollows 
And the white gull that follows 
Shall be swift to keep my side : 

And when from those rich valleys 
I leap great ridges golden, 
Bright foothills of the sea, 
I shall not lonely be, 
For the vast depths beneath me 
Shall glow till they bequeath me 
The glory of the olden 
Castilian chivalry; 

(For where the kelp waves slowly 

Are secrets dim and holy — 

For children looking down 

Have seen strange children playing 

By weed and bright hued stone, 

And bearded men in helmets 

That ever pace alone 

In the wide ocean gardens 

That are of far renown.) 

Then in gay grace shall rise 

From each battered galleon 

The adventurers of Spain 

With their puncheons of old wine, 

And their treasure streams shall flow 

From the velvet gloom below 

And shall heave and glow 

On the brine : 



12 



OFF CATALINA 

And the great Pacific moon 
Will kiss each pale doubloon 
As it magically swings — 
For her delight and wonder 
Are still in ancient things, 
In the stately ships of plunder 
And the scarlet robes of kings, 
In the splendor and disdain 
That will come to earth again 
When the souls of men again 
Have wings. 

Oh, nightly shall my soul — 
Though it be too sweet a doom — 
Drift like a fleck of foam 
Through the empurpled gloom ; 
When has each gallant Don 
To his lost galleon gone, 
And the moon has drunk her fill 
From the wine cup of the sea, 
Then will I find my rest 
In a cove my eyes have seen. 
Where lurks a mystic green — 
For I know these hidden waters 
With most mysterious sheen 
Have once a sea-king's daughter's 
Enchanted love-pool been. 

Then shall all motive cease, 
And I will lie at peace 
All the day long, 
Till comes a twilight song 
From the unfathomed deeps 
And from far mainland heights 
The dying sunlight creeps — 
And come the flashing stars 
And the bright moon — 
And Catalina lies 
In mists a-swoon. 

13 



THE SONS OF DAN 

Through great sun-blinded valleys where bones of the 

lost are strewn, 
To lurching of white-topped wagons and din of household 

pans, 
To lowing of stumbling cattle, whip-crack, and bitten 

groan. 
The Mormons march with the Lord of Hosts in the dust 

of their caravans. 

Their broad-brimmed hats with the tattered rims are 

white with alkali, 
They ride in a cloud with the sun before like an olden 

lure of flame ; 
They thirst and choke while the women crouch by pallets 

where madmen die 
Through arrow, and fever, and fortune-thrust for the 

glory of God's name. 

Ever and ever the scouts drift in with long black guns 
unslung, 

With tangled beards and red-rimmed eyes that have out- 
stared Death's own, 

And the wagons wheel as the horses leap, urged on by 
lash and lung. 

And the charging Kiowas divide on a ring of fire-flecked 
stone. 

Arises a chant where flame-beds glow to the Grod of the 

Sons of Dan ; 
Deep coulees throb to thundering hymns that shake the 

prairie sod; 
And the vast black night that closes down like evil doom 

of Man 
Quivers long to a battle song of the grim old Mormon 

God. 

14 



THE SONS OF DAN 

For these are the Men of the Covenant, of the Word and 

Avenging Sword, 
They ride to the blast of Gabriel, on way to a goodly vale, 
By trails of death, by lonely plains, past floods with 

never a ford, 
They follow a splendid prophecy, a flame, and a Holy 

Grail. 

And the word of the prophet is certain; they shall build 
an abiding-place. 

They shall make them another Jerusalem, with a taber- 
nacle of prayer; 

And the Men of the Lord shall raise them up new seed of 
a mighty race 

And the Sword of God shall go with them wherever the 
bugles blare. 

There are bones where the wagons rumble, there are 

skulls in the prairie grass, 
But on they roll through storm and sun in the might of 

a firm accord; 
For the Sons of Dan shall greatly thrive whenever it 

comes to pass 
That they raise them a splendid city to the glory of the 

Lord. 



15 



THE BALLAD OF A WALKING-BOSS 

In a rickety rig on a cloudy day, 

With freeze-up hurrying down, 

The walking-boss and a straw-boss came 

Joggling into town ; 

Come racketting into Saskatoon 

And straight for the Queen Hotel, 

Knowing the place was half saloon 

And the other half was hell. 

Down, down, went the rot-gut rye 
As fast as the bar-keep set 'em, 
And the walking-boss with a bleary eye 
Could scarcely wait to get 'em; 
They set 'em up and he put 'em down 
And every lick seemed sweeter, 
But the little straw-boss he giv' out 
And went to sleep by the heater. 

And the slusher-men and the teamsters come 

With all the trash that are, 

And some were strong for the Grand Trunk Line 

And some for the C. P. R., 

And some of 'em swore by old Jim Hill 

More'n they swore by the Cross, 

But the favorite names was 'Dan and Bill' 

That hired the walking-boss. 

And this was the Fall of Nineteen-eight 
When the times was slack and slacker, 
With grub-stakes low and credits so 
It was hard to get tobaccer; 
But the walking-boss had come to town 
And it looked like something brewing, 
So we hung around and we hung around 
For whatever was up and doing. 



16 



THE BALLAD OF A WALKING BOSS 

And after an hour the boss come out 

And he staggered a bit and swayed, 

And his blind eye goggled and rolled about, 

And this is the speech he made : 

At least, it's part of his speech, though he 

Didn't talk as the preachers do, 

And some that he said was a langwidge dead 

To all but a grading-crew. 

*'Lads — " he roared, till the sidewalk shook 

With the sounds stentorian — 

* ' Here I am and I works, by God, 

For them devils. Bill and Dan : 

Twenty years in this damned land 

I've scorched and frizzled and friz 

In a hundred above to sixty below 

As the way of the country is. 

** Twenty years in the sand and clay 

Of one or another line. 

Shoving and driving a right o ' way 

On grub as 'ud sicken swine; 

Cutting sleugh-hay to feed the c 'ral 

Till the bosses up an' died, 

And whenever they fell the harness bruk 

Or the string 'ud come untied. 

**Rot — rot — in the cooking-pot 
And the tents forever in holes ; 
We didn't care for our bodies much 
And we figgered we had no souls ; 
We was raw and red with the prairie itch. 
We was grey-backed head to toes — 
Oh, some may talk of the torment rack 
But we old graders knows. 



17 



THE BALLAD OF A WALKING BOSS 

**Some of the time we'll get our pay, 

Most of the time we won't, 

But we'll never starve till Doom o' Day 

If Bill and Daniel don't — 

We may get sick with the pizen stuff 

That comes through the cook-shack door. 

But them as survives 'ill be so tough 

That they'll live for evermore. 

' ' So come along — y ' grey-back crew — 

I'll hire y' every man, 

I '11 baste your hides as I always do 

For the good of Bill and Dan : 

I'll feed y' grub as a dog 'ud scorn, 

And drinks as 'ill taste like brine ; 

I'll make y' wish y' had never been bom 

But I'll build the Goose-Lake Line." 

And in we went to the swimming bar 

And the boss he paid the bill — 

They set 'em up and we put 'em down 

With a grab and a right good will ; 

Till, one by one, they carried us out 

Where the trail to camp began. 

Where the walking-boss was sobbing about 

The glory of Bill and Dan. 



18 



ENGLISH 



19 



AVON MEMORIES 

Gaffer Perks on his chain of land 

Smokes his pipe in the church's shadow; 

An old Brown Bess in his gnarled left hand 

And a tilting eye for rooks that fly 

From the trees down by the haulme meadow. 

And the Avon flows silently, gently down, 
Passing on, passing on, 

With leaves from the elms of Stratford town 
And Godfrey's bell tolls gloomily. 

The long fields surge with dark-green wheat, 
Knee-deep meadows softly sway, 
The Cotswolds glow with copper flame 
And the gale dies with the dying day : 

I hear the voices of wandering lovers 
Eound the willow hidden bends, 
Here and there a silent shape 
Crouches low in the reedy covers — 
As it was in olden times 
When the cowled freres came 
And fished by dreamy Avonside, 
And heard the nightingale begin 
With the first convent chimes. 

Slow — low — 
Through the dewy gloom. 
Music falls from grey old towers 
Upon knighthood 's crumbled tomb 
And hidden fields of flowers. 

It is a land of dreams. 
Dark hills and magic moors, 
Of Druid oaks and streams 
Flowing to ancient shores : 



21 



AVON MEMORIES 

There is mystery here in the dusky lanes 
About that time when the May-bloom falls, 
For, when the eye sees no thing pass. 
There is sound of feet upon the grass : 
Kiflfle of lace and shirr of satin, 
Lilt of French and drone of Latin, 
And ring of steel on vanished walls ; 
And, at times, in the pulsing quiet, 
Hedges shiver with ghostly riot 
Of mad, barbaric strains 
From buried banquet halls. 

This is a land where queens have journeyed 
In blossoming-orchard-times of old. 
To music of rich pageantry ; 
Through the valley riding down 
With passing glint of gold. 

From Tewkesbury up to Stratford town 
In the keep of Bredon Hill, 
If in dark of dawn you listen 
You can hear the shrill 
Piping of the morriss dancers 
On the winding river road ; 
You may see the spangles glisten 
Though the dancers ' feet are still. 

And if you were not born among 

Avon's scattered fairy rings. 

And cannot see the elvery 

Nor hear the pagan strings ; 

Still, when from straw-thatched cottage roofs 

The slow blue wreaths arise 

In the dim hush of April morns 

Like breath of sacrifice — 

And the dark hills encircle you around — 

What need to whisper to the wise 

That here is haunted ground ? 

22 



AVON MEMORIES 

Ripples in the shallows by the bridge 

Where the road goes up to Cropthorne on the hill, 

Summer haze and ladysmocks 

And clack of Fladbury mill — 

And cackle of grey geese in the meadows, 

And gold and purple mists upon it all, 

And cows going home through the shadows 

That softly — softly — fall. 

Hark! Hark! Godfrey's Bell! 
Far — how far — it seems: 
Still it tolls for Avon's souls 
A grim and steady Saxon knell — 
And — now — it tolls my dreams. 



23 



THE LABORER IN THE MISTS 

Toiling throughout the day, wet with the fogs of Novem- 
ber, 

With a brief, white, muffled sun looming at height of noon, 

And somewhere, hidden but near, plum boughs dripping 
in rhythm — 

Laboring in the mists, with a joy that it's pain to remem- 
ber. 

Laboring in the mists ; spading the loam and dreaming 

Of glorious days to be for the great, gay, loving Earth ; 

When the minds of men should be free and the gates of 
beauty be open, 

And good should mightily reign, from a throne unshak- 
able streaming. 

And then home through the dark, with the mists still fall- 
ing, 

And the lights of the cottages gleaming, cheerily yellow 
and warm. 

And to see, ere the gate clicked as it heavily swung be- 
hind me, 

My mother's form in the doorway, and hear her anx- 
iously calling. 

And then, when the meal was done, to rise from the fire 

red-glowing 
And pass out into the clinging, drizzling murk again 
And tramp almost till morn, though never a star was 

shining, 
And ever to stride with a vision about me flaming and 

flowing. 



24 



THE LABOBEE IN THE MISTS 

But to labor still in the mists, with dreams and the joy of 

dreaming, 
And the chill fogs thickening ever, the visions distant and 

dim — 
And the heart-glow smothered at nightfall, and no voice 

fondly calling, 
And forever, a burden of thought, and no light in the wide 

world gleaming? 



25 



AN APRIL NIGHT 

Some loose thatch on the farm, barn fluttered as we went 
through the lane 

And the sweet, wet stars looked down, like the lights of 
Malvern town 

After the warm-breathed valley has been washed by twi- 
light rain. 

Far up the tops of the elms were roaring, a hundred feet 

or so, 
And the old barn's battered vane was creaking a wild 

refrain 
As it pointed away to the hills where the waning moon 

was low. 

And little we recked of dripping branches and brown mud 
under our feet, 

For we walked to the pulse of Spring — an aching, riot- 
ous thing — 

In a dim Arcadian quiet filled with the ripple of green 
wheat — 

Till we came to the broad highway that leads from village 

to sleepy town 
And lingered a moment there like lovers that unaware 
Come to an ancient, magical road that leads to a land un- 
known : 

For the broad highway went winding away to where the 

low moon shone : 
Like a ribbon of bridal white it ran through the fragrant 

night, 
It ran through the fragrant night, it seemed, to the moon, 

and on, and on. 



26 



AN APRIL NIGHT 

But the yellow moon drew down at last the long black 

hills behind ; 
And, treading the dewy sod, it seemed that a lovelorn god 
Was abroad — for a far-off nightingale was flinging his 

soul on the wind. 

And the apple blossoms were falling, falling, and drifting 

into the lane — 
And we walked like lovers dead — who had not, living, 

wed — 
We were too full of awe to kiss when we came to the house 

again. 



27 



HAUNTED REAPING 

Out we go in the dusk of morn 

Over the hills to the reaping, 

Our sickles crash on the golden corn 

When the rest of earth is sleeping; 

Bending and bowing, bending and bowing, 

Gathering in and striking free, 

Gripping the sheaf with the sickle and knee 

And laying it down for the tying. 

The dim, dark hills are all around. 
The silence breeds a sullen dread. 
The sickle strokes like shrieks resound 
In chambers of the murdered dead. 
But one dull star stays overhead, 
The waning moon seems all awry; 
The dying night is loth to die 
Though in the east the mists are red. 

Over the stubble chill winds creep 
Like breaths from a dead world blowing, 
God ! it is awesome so to reap 
With such strange fancies growing. 
Bending and bowing, bending and bowing, 
Gathering in and striking free, 
Gripping the sheaf with sickle and knee 
And lajdng it down for the tying. 

My father reaps six feet before 
With hairy arms as hard as steel, 
I hear the com as oft of yore 
Before his whirling sickle reel ; 
And, God ! what wild, mad horrors steal 
Bidding me take too long a stride 
And drive my sickle in his side 
And grind his face beneath my heel. 



28 



HAUNTED REAPING 

I dread this brooding, awful morn 
With its haunted hush dismaying — 
It seems as though pale souls newborn 
Our curved wet blades were slaying, 
Bending and bowing, bending and bowing, 
Gathering in and striking free, 
Gripping the sheaf with the sickle and knee 
And laying it down for the tying. 

My father's beard is grizzled grey — 
It trails like mist in heavy wind — 
He was three-score yesterday. 
And yet I reap six feet behind. 
Lean he is, and bent, and lined, 
And he has held me many years ; 
And still I toil in hate and tears. 
And still he swears that he is kind. 

Ah, God! will morning never break? 

I know he is old and loving, 

Yet I hear, with every stroke I take, 

A demon with me moving ; 

Bending and bowing, bending and bowing, 

Gathering in and striking free, 

Gripping the sheaf with the sickle and knee 

And laying it down for the tying. 

At last ! The morning comes at last ! 
The hills are rich with filtered gold. 
And through the vales a glory vast 
In glowing might is swiftly rolled ; 
And hard my father's hand I hold. 
And standing 'midst the gleaming corn. 
With him thank heaven for the morn — 
With lips that still are grey and cold. 



29 



OH! FOR A DARK-GREEN HILL-TOP 

Oh ! for a dark-green hill-top close to the sky 
And the song of bronzy bees in the golden gorse 
And bleating of new-born lambs in the waving fern 
And warm winds blowing out of a purple waste, 
And, deep and dim, away in the Western skj^, 
A dancing silver gleam from the distant sea, 
And a faint breath of the salt air thrilling me 
As in a time gone by. 

Oh ! for a dark-green hill-top close to the sky 
And the valley beneath me filled with April foam 
When plum and cherry and pear blossom smothers the 

land; 
And an olden madness drifting through my veins 
And an old song on my lips as the twilight falls, 
With longing for dim paths and daffodils 
And sweet wild roamings on the lonely hills, 
And trysts in darkened lanes. 

Oh ! for a dark-green hill-top close to the sky 

And cool winds on my throat and the night-time near 

And the white fog of the lowlands creeping higher, 

And all about a rustling sea of fern 

Till alone of the wide world left is a tiny isle 

Moored on a spectral flood that is silent and cold 

Till the dreams of youth are mine and the magic of old — 

That sleeps such a long, sad while. 



30 



THE TRAIVIP GIRL 

She had come traipsing through the morning mist 
Out of a dewy by-lane ; head held high, 
A gaudy handkerchief around her hair, 
And a blue bundle swinging in her hand ; 
Like some wild gipsy wench from Hungary. 

I was in one tree, she was in another, 
Both of us tanned and lithe as savages ; 
And her quick eyes came dancing to my own 
Until my heart pulsed faster, and, shame-faced, 
I stopped awhile to take her basket down. 

Of course I had to climb the ladder rungs 
To pass the wicker measure back to her, 
And if one brown arm found a curving waist. 
And if her lips were riper than the fruit — 
What would you have? I was well past sixteen. 

The wind came singing through the glossy leaves 
Of that old plum plantation on the hill. 
Set coppice-like above the valley lands 
That lay half brooding in September haze. 

Close down below us, in among great elms, 
The villages lay nestled. 

There was Moor 
And Upper Moor, and Wyre, and then one saw 
The spire of Pershore Abbey, and away 
Far to the west, the blue of Malvern Hills. 

Dimly, and to the right, the Wrekin's peak 
Quivered in mist and scarcely could be seen ; 
While, to the north, Throckmorton's thatch appeared 
And Abberton's tall steeple speared the sky, 
A landmark for the carters round about. 



31 



THE TRAMP GIRL 

Hillfurze and Fladbury, Cropthorne, Elmley Castle, 
Mossed roofs, grey stones, black beams and white- washed 

walls 
All huddled in among the yellowing trees ; 
And, like a brush-mark drawn around a bowl. 
The line of Broadway Hills that gently dipped 
To join the slopes of Bredon: in that gap, 
Farther removed, the Cotswold's stony fields 
Faded at last in amethystine haze. 

A clean wind blew and set the ladders swinging; 
The golden fruit swayed into swaying hands ; 
And I had ceased to pick, for she was singing 
Like some bright bird arrived from fairy lands ; 
Seated upon her ladder's highest rung 
Among the moving boughs and lightly clinging — 

* * Eyes like diamonds, teeth like pearls ; 
There's none that can beat 'em 
The Donegal girls — " 

Eyes like diamonds ? Yes ! and stars, and dew, 
And veils of falling water which the moon. 
Rising above black woodlands, filters through. 

Oh ! she sat singing there and half-reclining 
Under the drooping fruit and swayed in tune 
And with the rhythm her brown arms went twining 
Among the leaves and her dark hair was blown 
Towards my face. 

We two were all alone 
As on a mountain island near the sky, 
Swinging in heights of magic forestry. 

All that day long she sang, or told me tales 
Of dusty roadways winding through the hills 

32 



THE TRAMP GIRL 

Of Derbyshire, and craggy paths of Wales 

Where one might stand and watch white specks of sails 

Creep into distant Bristol-by-the-Sea. 

She knew of lonely farms in hidden vales 

Where good-folk lived who kept to bygone ways, 

A hundred years or more behind the times : 

There she would dance and sing old English rhymes — 

Often of highwaymen and press-gang days — 

I can remember a stray verse or two 

Rendered in the true quavering ballad style. 

"The press-gang came for William 
When he was all alone, 
They beat him and they bound him 
And took him for their own — " 

And then a ribald one ; supposedly 

Sung by a country girl who went to hire 

At Stratford Mop— 'Twas called ''The Bed-Making" — 

I begged her in sheer shame to leave the last 

Long stanza out ; but, no, she had to sing 

It twice as loud — and I have always thought 

The village girls picked up that melody. 

Out of a wanderer's repertory 
She sang 'Lord Bakeman' dwelling on his joys 
Among the lovely Saracens — and then 
Swung to a legend, written — who knows when? 
To explain the short life of a willow tree. 

Once her mirth died, and for a little while 
She talked of childhood in black Dudley streets. 
Of frowsy slatterns, cops, and drunken men ; 
And how, one day, she watched gay caravans 



33 



THE TRAMP GIRL 

Rattling through town and saw the gipsy folk 
Happy and brown, in ragged gaudery. 

That was the end of grimy brick and stone — 
A short week later she was cuddled close 
Among the bilberry brush of Lickey Hills. 

Then her mood changed ; she whistled like a lark 

And burst into a ditty of the day 

Not two weeks out of London — changed again 

And sang as sweet and pure a lullaby 

As ever crooned a baby into sleep. 

Slowly the shadows lengthened through the valley; 
The wind died down, until a drowsy calm 
Drifted upon us in late afternoon : 

And she ceased singing, but went on and on 
With tales of wandering — 

Into Somerset 
And lovely Devon, where pink apple-bloom 
Drifts through May sunshine, and old hawthorn trees 
Shake down their petal clouds in grassy lanes. 

But when she spoke of the sea I hid my eyes 
And hardly heard ; because I saw white sails 
Coming and going, as ever in my dreams. 
And felt the salt sea-blood within my veins 
Pulsing to England's stubborn heritage. 

And when the Autumn dark was almost falling, 
And trooping from all directions, pickers came 
Down to the weighing place ; when sieves were piled 
And, trudging lane and road, the village folk 
Went home to lighted windows — then I looked 
For my dear wanderer ; called, and called again. 



34 



THE TRAMP GIRL 

And did not find her in the grassy lane 

Where she had sworn — between kisses — she would be ; 

And never found her : 

God ! what passionate grief 
Swept me and seared me all the haunted night 
That set my feet upon the final road 
Where, until death, the free go gipsying. 



35 



LAST LOAD HOME 

Through the darkening hawthorn lanes 
Come the rolling, groaning wains 
With heavy horses plodding on — 
Like steeds that tread the paths of Doom - 
''Last load home — Last load home — " 
Hay and maids and meadow bloom, 
And brown-faced men that tramp along 
To a rare old pagan song 
That thunders through the falling gloam. 

Slowly comes the summer moon 
And peers into the scented shadows, 
Into sweet and ancient meadows 
Where the ghostly mists arise. 
Till up and down the Roman road 
The silver tangle shifts and quivers 
Like the light of magic rivers 
Flowing through a haunted land : 

It creeps upon the swaying load 
And on and ever on it follows 
Over hills and through deep hollows 
Where the song is like old bells 
Echoing in deserted shrines, 
And ringing down forgotten wells 
Where the moonlight never shines. 

The harness jingles measuredly, 
The whiffle-trees and wheels complain, 
And close behind with pikes on shoulder 
Trudge the sturdy country men ; 
Once the moon is dimmed and then 
Through half a mile of blackened shade 
We pass into a time far older - — 
Hearing half-familiar things — 



36 



LAST LOAD HOME 

The crash of hoofs ; the clang of steel 

Beating on an armored knee, 

And woven chain that chinks and rings 

A grim barbaric melody, 

And, back behind where pikemen tread, 

A steady chant of drunken song 

That mocks the flesh of distant dead : 

But down the hill towards the mill 

To music of a silvery weir 

The load rolls on, the song roars on. 

And cottage windows are aglow, 

And through the gloom the thatched roofs loom 

In a shaggy Saxon row 

Beneath the church tower's Norman frown; 

And in towards the ricks we go, 
Swaying down the rutted road. 
Moonlight all about the farm. 
Moonlight on the spreading elms 
And f airying the lurching load — 
And through the chorus, beating slow, 
''Last load home — Last load home — " 
A rhythmic murmur seems to flow 
Like music of the enchanted loam 
That shook with battle long ago. 



37 



OIL OF MAN 

(English Folklore) 

Steal the skull of a murdered man 

Before the magical juice of his brain be dead ; 

And do it in windy dark of a summer morn 

With no stars overhead : 

For if light shall shine on the grisly thing 

You hug in the crook o ' your sleeve 

Under your arm it shall gibber and dring 

And moan and bitterly grieve — 

And if you should not heed its cries 

But still, and still, go on, 

It shall set its pale teeth over your heart 

And suck till you be done. 

But if no light shall shine upon it 
Before you reach your room, 
Then that thing shall be sodden and silent 
And you shall mold its doom. 

You shall bolt your doors and shutter your windows 

Till all be tomby still, — 

And take a dried root of monkshood. 

And sprigs of rue and gill — 

And burn them on a smouldering fire 

To thwart the thing's illwill. 

You shall set the skull in an oaken clamp 
That was beam of a gallow 's tree ; 
You shall take an auger and slowly bore 
Until you come to the moldy, damp, 
Thick-clotted mystery. 

You shall scoop it out with a weasel's leg 
That was trapped on graveyard soil — 
Then you shall crouch by the low red fire 
And chuckle to hear it boil — 



38 



OIL OF MAN 

And if you stir it more than thrice 
You never shall get the oil. 

Three dark hours it shall simmer and bubble 
And you shall three times name the dead — 
You shall three times name your trouble 
"With hands upon the grisly head — 
Then shall you take the cauldron off 
And drain the dreadful stew, 
Three times three through a silver sieve 
Shall pass that frightful brew. 

Then, as it cools, a glimmering glow 
Shall light the silver pan — 
And you shall stare and shiver and mow — 
At sight of Oil of Man. 



39 



THE LAND OF PLUMS 

This is the land of plums : all England knows 
Its magic beauty ; like a mighty loom 
Of giant fabric changing with the days. 

First lady elms burst out in blossoming sprays, 
Half buds, half flowers, and shake their pollen down ; 
And last year's leaves are tossed about and whirled — 
Along the sunlit streets of Pershore town. 

And so comes April. High on Scarry Bank 
One sees red shawls in lanes of snowy bloom, 
Where village women hoe the mellow soil 
On every curve and hollow of the hill 
Under the fleece-flocked blue of laughing skies. 

Slope after slope ; as far as eye can see ; 
From Evesham to Tewkesbury, up and down, 
All Avon 's Vale is white with fairy showers 
Of petals that continually blow 
Upon the vale-folk stooping to their toil. 

The centuried elms of Fladbury rise above 
The Norman church's square of crumbling stone, 
Half hidden in a maze of loveliness — 
Even upon the graves pale blossoms press, 
As though through some slight mystery of love 
That scatters fragrance on the forgotten dead. 

Plum petals in a laughing girl's brown hair, 
Plum petals blowing in at cottage doors, 
Plum petals drifting down on daffodils — 
Sweet petals floating, floating everywhere 
In that white valley cradled by dark hills. 



40 



THE LAND OP PLUMS 

Autumn is here : the shocks stand in stray fields : 
The roads are dim with dust ; the loaded drays 
Forever come and go. 

Fast ripening fruit 
Cloys the warm air in these ambrosial days. 

Purple and yellow, golden-scarlet, red ; 
Soft cloudy bloom, like mist against warm skies, 
Clinging upon the curves of glowing cheeks 
Cuddled in wicker baskets of brown hue — 

Rich, meaty, luscious flesh as ever grew 
When Father Adam wandered Paradise ; 
Juices like fairy wine of flowers and dew 
Ripened in caverns where no mortal eyes 
Ever have looked — nor shall till mirth is dead. 

Somewhere a girl is singing in a tree 

Perched on a perilous ladder's topmost rung, 

Trilling an olden golden melody 

Dear to the ears of age, for it was sung 

In days when Sweet Nell Gwyn was sorrow-free. 

In misty mornings on the Roman road 
You see the pickers coming, crook and pail. 
And hear a hundred dialects, with words 
That were long obsolete in Chaucer's time: 
A Glo'ster tinker rails at ^'thucky wench" — 
A barefoot hussy beating a black can 
And dancing to a quick old Lowland rhyme. 

Her ragged *man' comes shuffling slowly on 
Swaying a wrenching, gasping concertina — 
And, by his hair, it's plain that he has been a 
Guest of the Crown in days — or hours — bygone. 



41 



THE LAND OF PLUMS 

By Wyre 's low Saxon church, and by the Cross, 

Jangles and bangs a yellow caravan, 

Filling the street with war of pot and pan 

Until it halts beneath a giant elm 

Just opposite the moss-roofed village inn. 

(This was where Holland — Gipsy King of yore 
Sent his fist crashing through an oaken door.) 

After September things will settle down : 
Riot of picking-time a worn-out story, 
The rag-scum will have drifted back to town 
And left the valley to its Autumn glory. 

And then the land will give its soul again 
To quiet brooding : last wet leaves will fall. 
Till, like a gentle curtain over all. 
Will droop the creeping mists, the silent rain. 



42 



THE CAROL SINGERS 

About the middle day of Christmas week, 

Often when evening lights shone through soft rain, 

We used to gather in our muddy lane 

Just where it joins the pebbly village street, 

Under the vast thatch of an ancient barn. 

In lowered tones, not shrill, nor quite discreet, 

We village plagues would plan our wailing way, 

Discussing who was easily made sore 

By untrained banshees howling at his door; 

Who kept a terrier — unimpeachable — 

And who had apples still in winter store ; 

Who 'd give us cake and who would hand out pence 

And what the outcome if we gave offence 

By visiting the same place twice an hour. 

Oh, well ; we 'd start. The blacksmith 's house was first 
And four of us would treat him to 'Noel' — 
Misplacing aitches to a curious end — 
*'No-hell-l, No-hell, 
No-hell-1, No-hell—" 
And yet the blacksmith was our faithful friend 
And why on earth we should have done our worst 
Only the fiend that tickles boys can tell. 

(He had great love of melody and was wont 

When through the village church his praise was poured 

In mighty thundering music to the Lord 

To shake down plaster on the baptismal font.) 

Bless that good man's good-temper; never boot 
Firewood, or coal, or curses came our way, 
And so we'd leave him to his evening peace 
And seek the farm of one who had been soured 
By too much cider and too little song. 



43 



THE CAROL SINGERS 

This was the domicile of Old Man Gray 

Who had not mellowed in his autumn ease 

Only as does the crab-tree 's acid fruit ; 

And, though we hardly thought that it would pay, 

We sought to cheer him as we went along. 

Therefore we chanted out an olden tale 

That he had maundered long, long years before 

After a gallon of some neighbor's ale. 

Something about a rabbit he had stalked 

Eound and around his barn one winter-time 

And time, and time, and time again been balked ; 

Until he 'scrotched' his head and cackled glee 

And bent the barrel of his trusty gun 

To a right angle — did it with his knee — 

And then he'd stealthily, to give no sign. 

Fitted it neatly round the corner-stun 

And killed that rabbit, shot clean round the bam 

And hit 'his own self in the lower spine. 

(The old man had learned wisdom. Rest assured 
He made no sign whatever he endured.) 

Then we 'd go on and try the village store 
And sometimes we would be invited in 
And given ancient biscuits from a tin 
That had been in its place ten years or more : 
Oh, she was wise, that widow, wise as sin ; 
If anything could quell our hideous din 
'Twas that dry gift — as stubborn as a door. 

And now we'd reach the gate of an old house 
With carved black eave-boards, thatch and diamond 

panes 
And wattle-plaster walls squared by great beams — 
For we were not so far from Shakespere's home 

44 



THE CAROL SINGERS 

Where Will was wont to revel and carouse — 
In fact one imp preserved the revered name. 

Then would be heard the too familiar strains 
Of that old carol — dear to English ears — 

'*Whi-il shepherds watched their flocks by night 
All seated on the grou-ound — ' ' 
And next would come loud scraping on a floor 
And voices cursing heart and soul and brains 
Of us dear children singing at their door. 

Oh, vile ingratitude : we brought them song 
And were rewarded by unleashed abuse — 
We fled, and met again, and wailed our hate. 
And howled a version that the ribald use. 

'*Whi-il shepherds watched their turnip-tops 
All bilin ' in the po-ot, 
A lump o ' soot came rolling down 
A-and spoiled the jol-ly lot." 

One day the rector caught us singing that : 
'Twas well for us His Reverence was fat. 

By now we 'd be in mood for further wrong 

And when — 'Come, let us adore Him — ' failed to 

please 
The village cobbler, we could change with ease 
To other words and accompaniment as strong — 
*'0h, come let us kick the door in — 
Oh, come let us kick the door in." 

But that would bring a chase, so we'd disperse 
Down foggy paths and meet at Robinhood — 
The dead know how that corner got its name — 
And somewhere by the church we 'd hear a curse 
And then a woman's voice — *' Why, Jim, for shame.' 

45 



THE CAROL SINGERS 

But when we stood by Goody Barton's gate 
Only the minstrel three who sang in choir 
Lifted their voices in a Christmas hymn 
As sweet and holy as the angels know ; 
And when the old lady came her eyes were dim, 
Her lips were quivering, and she trembled so 
She scarce could fill our hands from a great plate 
Heaped with the toothsome stuffs that boys desire. 

And when we trooped into the road again 
There was the cobbler — saying *he had heard 
Us singing, and it minded him of birds 
Singing in the plum-trees after rain — 
His missis wasn't well, and couldn't stir, 
So would we come along and sing for her?' 

Of course we went — perhaps a trifle shamed — 
And sang our hearts out and refused all fee 
And sympathised with them because some rogues 
Had been around there doing deviltry. 

Then we'd go home, all munching, yet lamenting 
One thing; the absence of delightful snow. 
Most needful to a game of our inventing 
Which was, to make great balls and then to throw 
These high above the chimney-pots until 
One fell inside and, plunging down the flue, 
Squashed on the hearth-fire twenty feet below. 

Heavens ! how I recall the hullabaloo 

When one dropped into Granny Harding's stew. 



46 



NIGHT MOODS 



47 



THE OLD GODS MARCH 

The grim gods of the past have arisen, 
The black swamps throb and the mountains boom 
And the dust from their iron-sandalled feet 
Shrouds the sun in a blood-red gloom : 
Out of the Northern mountain passes 
Flame the banners and glare the swords, 
The old gods march from their wild morasses, 
The old gods march with their ancient hordes, 
With scarlet banners and songs of death; 
From marshes white with the bitter brine 
The boar-herds gather, the wolf -clans whine 
Till the land is foul with their steaming breath : 
And the old gods bellow, the old gods roar. 
And the hills shake and the grey seas rave, 
For the old gods march with a thundering tread 
Whose echoes thrill in the nether wave, 
Shaking the bones of a myriad dead 
As in red days of yore. 

Glare of torches in dead men's eyes 
And black nights lit by towns aflare. 
And things of horror and claws that tear, 
And reeking rivers that bloodily rise 
To the old gods ' tempest blare. 

Banners black with the blood and smoke 
High in the eddying battle van. 
And great swords red with the murder-stroke. 
And torches aflame as the night comes on — 
For the old gods march in the shame of man. 
The old gods march — sweet days are done — 
The fires of home or the fires of hate ? 
There is no choice in the wide world — none — 
But we must stand where the old gods tread, 
In ranks of steel, and steady and grim 
Chanting the sweet, wild battle-hymn 
That the old gods hate and dread. 

49 



PASSING OF THE MAD SINGERS 

In the curve of a glooming cape we huddled and shivered 

and peered 
Seeing the grey souls of the Mad Singers embark 
From a dimly luminous shore, unsteadily shifting and 

weird 
And hearing forever a voice far-thundering into the 

dark-— 

"Out! Shove out of the bay! the gales are heaving the 

main; 
We will ride the crashing ridges through black sheets of 

driving rain, 
We will swing and glide in the dark curves of the grim 

sea valleys again. 

"On ! with might of madness and gasping glory of power ! 
The harp of the tides is under our hands ; it throbs and 

thunders of unknown lands, 
And the moon drifts and sways and lifts like a wet pallid 

flower. 

"Swing her prow on a savage course till the South stars 

flutter and fade ; 
The Pagan lore was a flame of truth in the world-life's 

icy shade — 
For a god pulls at our plunging sail till the smoking ropes 

are frayed.'* 

And the howling winds of the world tore at the skies and 

sea 
All under the far-away glow of a mounting moon, 
And we saw their black prow lift like a chained Thing 

breaking free 
And heard from out of the wrath faint notes of an old 

mad tune. 



50 



A MIDNIGHT SONG 

I shall go mad at last through too much dreaming, 
With fret and stress of this insatiate brain, 
Burst clinging bond and dully clanging chain 
And pass to some far land with mad folk teeming : 

There azure fields shall heave with golden roses 
Beneath white skies that know not sun nor moon, 
Yet, with the boisterous winds of afternoon. 
Great purple stars shall shade what sleep uncloses. 

There shall be ruby ponds a-drunk with plunder 
Of silver lilies roseate to their stain, 
And drowsing leaves half-dead with that they drain. 
And milk-white fishes swimming those leaves under. 

There shall be paths of ice through molten mazes. 
Black mountain peaks up-tilting that pale sky, 
And strange new fields with coins of gold heaped high 
That breed and seed beneath rich crimson hazes. 

There shall be cliffs that front not foaming surges 

But lip the cleft whence greening vapor rolls. 

Foul with a myriad years of rotting souls 

And slow, sick winds weighed down by freight of dirges : 

Ay, sinking lands and breaths of burning waters, 
And lakes of blood — wherein I shall bathe long — 
Float to the weaving of this midnight song 
To which, near soon, shall dance the madmen 's daughters. 



51 



A WINTER GALE 

A gale roars from the sea and the hollow valleys are 

booming, 
The black wrack of the storm leaps out and harries the 

flying moon, 
The wind is like the thrust of Fate that forces Man to his 

dooming 
And, from some tangled ocean floor, to the weeds and 

wash of a dim white shore 
Grey things creep up, grey things creep out, and hunch 

themselves and croon. 

There is sound of feet on the lonely beaches where sane 

men never tread, 
And a stealthy noise of clashing teeth that turns the flesh 

to snow; 
And weird light glows and comes and goes like lamps that 

lead the dead 
Through awful caverns of deep gloom in the vast dead 

depths below. 

And above are the mighty winds that tear an ancient song 

from the sea, 
A terrible song, a secret song, that wise men hear — and 

die — 
A growling chant of the marching tides, a dirge and a 

prophecy 
Of glorious golden ages drowned and gone as leaves go by, 
And splendor of red days to come before the world wins 

free. 

A heaving hope and a damning dread are riding the 

racing wrack, 
A surging drone and a driven moan comes out of a rift 

where stars are sown. 
There is horror adrift in that star-flecked rift that lifts 

from the savage ranges, 

52 



A WINTER GALE 

There is terror stark in the haunted dark that swoops 

when the dim glow changes, 
As the swift moon swings from vampire wings that hunt 

in her ghostly track. 

A wild cry in the thundering woods that answer the bel- 
lowing wave, 

And a weird wail in the sweep of the gale like a thin song 
of the grave, 

A thin tune of a bitter thing that creeps where sick men 
rave: 

And the sea calls as the moon falls and the world gathers 
gloom. 

And on the beach those grey things screech their jests of 
mortal doom. 



53 



THE BOGGING OF DEATH 

All in a gloomy wood 

By Wur's morass 
And in the black rain I stood, 

For Death to pass. 

I heard the hour of ten 
From far clocks boomed, 

Then all grew still again, 
By night entombed. 

The heavy fir boughs dripped 

On my bare head; 
The unseen leaves I gripped 

Seemed drowned with dread. 

And shiv'ring with desire 

And crouching low, 
I saw Wur's eyes of fire 

Dance to and fro. 

I knew the tarn's green edge 

Whereby they glowed, 
Where runs through withered sedge 

A haunted road : 

And shuddering with hate 

I knew the spot 
Where my love plucked of late 

Forget-me-not ; 

And, dank with horror's dews. 

Again my eyes 
Saw through the bubbling ooze 

A white hand rise : 



54 



THE BOGGING OF DEATH 

And through thin lips my breath 

Like poison came, 
And for the throat of Death 

I leaned aflame. 

I heard that old fooPs feet 

Squelch in soft sod, 
And rustling sedges greet 

His groping rod. 

Then from a sudden rift 

The wild, wet moon 
Through heaven seemed to drift, 

With cold a-swoon. 

And as she cleft the night 

I leapt and clasped 
Death's form with such delight 

That my heart gasped. 

I tore from his white bones 

The sombre cloak, 
With laughter for his groans 

The gaunt ribs broke : 

By those grim sockets deep, 

Where never eyes 
Drooped with the bliss of sleep, 

I dragged my prize 

Through mists, of poison bred, 

To that green spot 
Where my love gathered 

Forget-me-not. 

There, where all treacheries lie, 

Death sank in slime, 
And until morning I 

And Wur made rhyme. 

55 



THE SINGING SKULL 

Golden glowing the high crags shone, 
Somewhere, far, a slow bell rang, 
And this was in a grim ravine 
Where every rock was like a fang — 
My Love picked up a splintered skull 
And this is what it sang — 

** Dribble and drool — the world is old. 
The dead are better off by far — 
For I am one who lived in war. 
And who should better know than I? — 
Wisdom drips from the lips of a fool — 
Eather drops from rotting jaws — 
And this is as the Law of laws — 
Dribble and drool — dribble and drool. 

**From darkness of the eternal mold 
The flowers push up, the flowers unfold. 
From muck of earth come beauty rare — 
Dribble and drool — dribble and drool — 
When did Beauty last for long? 
I have seen the singer die 
As rang the first chord of his song — 
His pean that should glorify 
The fields of earth and vanquish care. 

'* Dribble and drool — above him now 
The farmer drives his shrieking plow ; 
The heavy hoof-beats boom above 
A brain that was the cup of love — 
Dribble and drool — dribble and drool : 
His brain lives on? His love lives on? 
Oh ! in some dusty library 
With un-cut leaves a volume lies 
That, some Spring day, a girl may prize — 
For daintiness of looks maybe. 



56 



THE SINGING SKULL 

** Dribble and drool — dribble and drool — 
This is a skull that once held song : 
I was a singer and I sang 
Of woe and bitter, senseless wrong; 
And high and higher my voice rang 
In tones of One they crucified, 
And women heard with sympathy, 
But — men brought that same bloody tree 
And nailed me on it — and — I died. 

*' Dribble and drool — What matter now? 
The loose teeth rattle in my jaws ; 
I raised a banner for a Cause, 
I poured my blood to bloat a sow. 
The drums of Freedom roared and rolled. 
We hailed the dawn of Liberty, 
We saw the tattered banners fold 
Above great piles of bloody staves — 
Dribble and drool — A century — 
And who are freemen! Who are slaves? 

"Dribble and drool — (Oh! hideous eyes!) 
And you would follow where I fell! 
Go down to black oblivion 
That is the Singer's nether hell: 
Meet flouts and jeers with song and pride 
While Justice hangs her heavy blade 
Upon her scales and tips the side 
Wherein all woes of Earth are laid. 

''Dribble and drool — I know the dream ; 
It beckons and the Singer goes. 
It is the Light, it is the Gleam 
That every fettered spirit knows ; 
The glamor of a deathless hope 
That out-lives shame and pain and scorn, 



57 



THE SINGING SKULL 

The radiance from a land that glows 
With glory of eternal morn. 

* ' Oh, Singers ! Earth may be reborn — 
Dribble and drool — But — I am dead. 
By you rich chaplets may be worn — 
But — lay me in a lonelier bed : 
Whereon no tyrant foot shall tread, 
Wherein no moan may penetrate — 
For I am sick with bitter thoughts 
Of creeping men that live by hate. ' * 

The crags above were gray and cold, 
It was a dread and desolate land ; 
I turned to my fair love, and she — 
Oh, God I was all in rags and old. 
The skull dropped from her withered hand, 
It crashed upon the awful ground, 
And those mad jaws clashed out again 
The Unknown Singer's last refrain — 
* * Dribble and drool — dribble and drool — 
Wisdom drips from the lips of a fool. ' ' 



58 



A SONG OF DARK HOURS 

Oh, Death, come soon — 

I am too sick of waiting 

Through sleepless nights of horror and of dread — 

Oh, Death, come soon: 

Let me be gone before another June 
Fills this mad world with fragrance of its roses; 
Let me lie still where human dust reposes 
Under the changing light of sun and moon. 

Come, clad in ivory robes of bridal beauty, 
I am so weary of this whirling brain 
That night and day beats out a dirge of duty 
Through murderous hours of pain. 

Oh, Shining Love, with the white clinging fingers 
That close the eyes in peace of lasting sleep, 
Fondle my hair, my brow, till I am deep 
In that long slumber where no memory lingers. 

Here, in the dark, as in a bridal chamber, 
I lie with arms outstretched and open eyes ; 
I have long known the haunted path that lies 
To your abode, and heard thereon a tune 
Wailing that wisdom is the shrine of fools. 

I have known passion like a searing flame. 
Felt Love's hot bosom crushed against my own, 
I have known wandering nights of raging shame 
And gripped red hands in darkness — and — alone 
Have bowed me down before the altar-stone 
Of bloody hate — in hells that I have known — 
Oh, Death, come soon. 



59 



A SONG OF DARK HOURS 

Let me be done, this night of madness passes ; 
The light beyond the window-panes is grey ; 
I shall be silent when the break of day 
Ruffles among dried weeds and lifeless grasses 
"Would that my sap had gone the selfsame way - 
Oh, Death — Oh, Death — come soon. 



60 



THE GALES OF AUTUMN ARE COMING 

The great gales of Autumn are coming — 

Bend, trees ; bow to your sorrow : 

Fly, red leaves, — you die tomorrow — 

The gales of Autumn are coming: 

They have tossed and rolled and smashed the sea 

Till the sinking sun has bloodied a mad commotion ; 

Only the vulture keeps the sky 

With straining wings and flaming eye — 

Foul, ragged ghoul of the darkening ocean. 

Woe and chill on a shrouded earth descending 
And a nameless fear that steals with breath foreboding, 
A creeping whisper of death with love 's dreams blending, 
A scattered rust that blows for the heart's corroding. 

The air is filled with a distant drumming 
Of far birds beating southward fast. 
The world is filled with roaring and humming 
Of far winds thundering blast on blast 
Through groaning gulches of northern ranges : 
Ho ! pines that have strangled the rocks, hold fast ! 
The clouds are mad, the whole world changes. 
The great gales of Autumn are coming. 



61 



THE FLEETS OF DOOM 

Dark, booming beaches under evil skies, 
Clouds torn by the wind and the world a 'roar. 
And fearful outlines heaving to far thunder. 
And all the West aflare with yellow light ; 
And vast grey monsters riding seas of wonder 
Against the gloom of night — 

And, sweeping down the mighty tidal surges, 
Froth-kissed as ever it veers, 
A weird wind wailing olden ocean dirges 
For souls of the buccaneers : 

For bones of the buccaneers 

That lie in the Southern and Northern seas, 

For the wave has a love of savagery 

And reeking victories : 

And the wave 's deep love for raging men 

And flame and clamor of grappling ships 

Is told in the ceaseless miracle song 

That rolls from her hungry lips. 

Then, sateless vampire, thunder thanks at last : 
Our blood must glut you, for the despairing shore. 
Riven and drenched by war 's red-dripping blast, 
Whispers to heaven that it can hold no more. 
Stifle all greedy murmur : you shall be 
Eimmed with rich floods that shall out-glare the suns, 
You shall be poppy steeped with that which we 
Pour from the giant lips of roaring guns : 

For, in dread harbors where your slow tides tremble 
Under the cold grey glances of the day. 
The grimly stark leviathans assemble 



62 



FLEETS OF DOOM 



In battle-stripped array ; 

And in them slumbers pride of mighty sorrow, 
And round them rolls the heavy breath of Fate, 
And every hour holds promise of dread morrow 
And devastating hate. 



63 



LURE OF LIGHT 

The grey seas heave and roar and sway 
Under a dim cloud-shrouded moon, 
And the mad white froth of an evil bay 
Flashes across our lantern glow : 

And Death's grim hands grip hard below 
At mortared seams of the yieldless stone 
While his voice in a low continuous thunder 
Tells the passing of all things known — 
Tolls all wisdom and dirges wonder 
And chants of Beauty's burial under 
Oblivion's starless snow. 

Out of the grey night sea-birds blow 
And smash their wings on the lantern glass ; 
Lured from the blackness of sea-wastes 
By hope of sunlight on green grass 
By shores where tepid currents flow. 

And even so — and even so — 

We smash our souls and fluttering fall : 

Youth and beauty and wisdom, all 

That wings from out of the stormy waste — 

We seek for a light, we seek a glow — 

We ask what only the dead may know — 

And, whirling on with hope and haste. 

We smash ourselves on an unseen glass — 

And like the crippled birds we go — 
Dust of chaos, blindly blown, 
We crash and fall to the mad seas under 
While Death with low continuous thunder 
Chants the passing of all things known. 



64 



DAWN-LIGHT 



65 



WHEN YOU HAVE DREAMED YOUR 
DREAM — 

When you have dreamed your dream of fame and power 

And, wakening, find it life's late afternoon. 

And know that labor will be done with soon 

And that your hope is like a wilting bower ; 

Rise from the agony of that bitter hour 

And force a smile and hum a wilful tune 

Of bygone nights beneath a magic moon 

When every sweet May meadow was in flower. 

So shall you come at last to day's black end 
And foot the gloomy path that none retrace, 
And laugh, because lost loveliness walks beside; 
And those who follow on the way you wend 
Shall look upon your carelessness of face 
And mould their days to die as you have died. 



67 



CERAMICS 

I had made pause between two dusty shelves 

Before a smoldering glory of rich glaze, 

A plum-bloomed purple thing without design. 

Ming? Oh, how the devil do I know? 

Only, before me sailed a fleet of junks 

With lateen sails hard cut against the moon. 

And white plum blossoms swirled like fragrant snow 

Against my face, and someone had my hand 

And tapped it lightly with a bamboo fan. 

There was a golden window on before 
With purple lanterns swaying in its glow. 
And, somewhere near, a shingly river shore 
Tinkling with music of a myriad shells, 
And from some grove of jade a nightingale 
Mingled his notes with those of far-off bells 
Ringing, it seemed, from lands of long ago. 

And then, behind me came some devotees 
Raving of Sevres, Delft, and Cloisonne ; 
Mouthing of Paris and a thousand things 
That trouble art — . 

And so I lost my dream 
Just as the spreading of its rainbow wings 
Was sweeping me to mystery of Cathay 
Over the silver froth of magic seas. 



68 



FROM A GARDENER TO A POTTER 

We two have handled earth so much 
And won such beauty from its mass 
That we shall scarcely fear its touch 
When Fate may nod and bid us pass. 

Rather, the clay and brave brown mold 
Will wrap us warm and work goodwill 
Until a thousand Springs have rolled 
Through the Great Potter's grinding mill; 

Then we shall stir and slowly rise 
And feel the sun and wind and rain, 
And thrill with glory of blue skies 
We had not thought to know again. 

And I shall live in grass and flowers, 
Because I loved them long ago. 
And drink my fill of silver showers 
And sway to all the winds that blow : 

And you? Your fame for many a day 
Will fire the art of older lands, 
A wondrous thing of perfect clay 
Made by a master-craftsman's hands. 



69 



THE SMITHY ABOVE THE MOON 

Oh, God is beating on his anvil 

In His smithy above the moon, 

And the star- sparks fly in fountain showers 

And some are souls and some are flowers 

And some are chords of a tune. 

An angel bends to the bellows 

And he puffs up golden clouds, 

And some float off through an amber glow 

And some drift down to the worlds below. 

And some are angel shrouds. 

And the roof of the smithy is purple 
And its rafters are of gold. 
And the fire of the forge forever is fed 
From a blazing heap of rubies red 
That it may never be cold. 

God 's hammer is clanging on the anvil — 
He is calling up the souls of men — 
To left of the moon where the light is dim 
You can see them drifting up to Him 
To be remade again. 

And He will bring them to the anvil 

In a hissing silver flame. 

And His blows shall shower them over the floor 

Until they fall to the Earth once more 

And magnify His name. 

Oh ! hear the ringing of the anvil 

Where the God-Smith beats above, 

For His blows are the pulse of mortal fate — 

And some men swear that He toils in hate — 

And — some — that He toils in love. 



70 



TO A PARAKEET 

Gabriel, I say — look well, 

For something I have loved with tears 

Is seeking Heaven's forestry. 

You will know it, Gabriel, 
By its plumage golden-green. 
Like a sunbeam on green grass ; 
You will know it, Gabriel, 
And when it comes to Heaven's gates 
Will smile and softly bid it pass 
Into God's valleys of sweet bowers 
And singing leaves and blowing flowers. 

But, Gabriel, when dusk draws near — 

The purple veil that is not night — 

And the great silver stars look down 

Upon a host of folded wings, 

Go softly, that he may not fear, 

And coax him to your shoulder white 

And still his sleepy twitterings — 

For, Gabriel, I think that he 

Will miss my love and — even in Heaven — 

May droop and pine for me : 

And, Gabriel, the shy wild things 

Of wood and hill that I have wept ; 

Bright eyes, brown fur, and flashing wings, 

Have they not into Heaven crept 

And made their home in some green dell 

Where I may find them, Gabriel? 

For I have loved with passionate 
Love, till I think — though red with sin — 
Christ for their sakes would swing the gate 
Of Heaven and, weeping, wave me in. 



71 



BIRDS THAT CLEAVE THE SHADOWS 

Turquoise tints in the heart of a golden rose, 

Carmine fire in a cool white lily cup; 

Something blown from out of the sun-drenched vales 

Of an old land whose flowers never close ; 

And again the azure shadows are floating up 

And the silver of dawn drifts down, 

And comes a whirr of murmuring wings, 

A sense of unseen exquisite things. 

And a flashing of green and flame 

When the grey moths have flown. 

From a dim, sweet land of love 

Where the Little People have gone. 

The Humming-Birds come through the dawn's blue dusk 

When Earth-Folk slumber on — 

Last of a reign of loveliness 

Where tiny souls for long 

Walked abroad in a petal dress 

And danced to the midge's song. 

Now, from the glamor of olden meadows. 

From brooks where elfin herdsmen sang. 

The Humming-Birds pass through the Veil of Shadows — 

The Humming-Birds — darting — alone — 

And the bent bells and the blooms half -blown 

Hear the echo of chimes that rang 

When fields of fairy seed were sown. 

In the scented hush of a silver hour 

When the eyes of June are heavy with sleep, 

Oh, Love, Young Love with the face of a flower. 

Steal out to our secret garden glade 

And, bright on bud and heavy on blade, 

You shall see the tears that the Wee Folk weep. 



72 



BIRDS THAT CLEAVE THE SHADOWS 

But the sorrow of this shall not be deep 
When the last veils are drowsily drawn, 
And, flashing and droning, heralding dawn, 
Back to Earth come the Humming-Birds : 
Back to Earth from a fairy lawn 
Where tiny shepherds tend their herds ; 
From golden vales by an amethyst sea 
That moves to a faint old melody — 
Back to Earth — darting — alone — 
Back from the sweets of elfin meadows — 
The bent bells and the blooms half-blown 
Bow to the Birds that cleave the Shadows. 



73 



WHEN I LAY DOWN MY CRAFTSMAN TOOLS — 

When I lay down my craftsman tools and pass 
And the wild life of Earth comes drifting in 
Upon this garden plot — like secret sin 
Lato the tender soul of a sweet lass — 
When brambles weave and tangle to a mass 
Of thorny things, and trees shut out the day, 
And sad-eyed friends who loved me wend this way 
And find no flowers among the untended grass — 

And ponder — with hearts murmuring 'Alas, 
Beauty and brain have sought their common clay. 
All that he did was as a wind that blows — ' 
Oh, then let memory see my garden as 
It was when breezes made the blossoms sway 
And all about was fragrance of the rose. 



74 



THE MUSE IN CHURCH 

The gates of brass are closed 
That guard the ivory altar ; 
The great arched rafters frown on thee 
Who art the harlot's daughter: 
With lips like a carmine rose, 
With robes like orchids rare, 
With breath like spices delicate 
That languorous pagans bear: 
With thy petal cheeks aglowing, 
And with thy white knees showing, 
And thy soft eyes that falter — 
Go hence, enticing demon child. 
Thou hast not beads nor psalter. 



75 



IN JANUARY FOG 

There, the familiar black old chimney-place 
Yawning and huge, filled with mysterious shadows, 
And pewter mugs on the heavy mantel shelf 
And candlesticks and ancient willow-ware — 
And, in the ingle-nook — oh — boyhood 's dream ! 
A flickering glow of firelight on dark hair. 
And then the garden gate would creak, and we 
Would meet in silence as two shadows meet, 
And take the footpath over Bubble Bridge 
And watch the town-lights blurring through the fog. 
What if the foot-path was a squelching bog? 
What if the fog had changed to mizzling rain? 
We scarcely knew we loved, but it was sweet 
To wander so — and, so back home again. 
All under mist and rain and dripping branches. 
Soft hands, wet hair, and eyes as pure as dew; 
Shy words beneath the spreading cottage thatch 
And then you'd go — 

I'd hear the clicking latch 
And see the firelight's sudden leaping glow 
And turn, in youth's mad chivalry of dream, 
And tramp the sodden fields all night — with you. 



76 



THERE IS A GARDEN IN MY BRAIN 

There is a garden in my brain 

And I shall make, before I die, 

A thing whose beauty shall be pain ; 

And men that feel its mystery 

Shall climb at midnight through black rain 

To sit beneath my twisted firs ; 

Till when the breast of morning stirs. 

And when the winds of morning rise. 

They shall go down the hill again 

With dreaming hearts and staring eyes. 

And when the golden bees awake 
To wander through my drifted blooms, 
And when the blossomed branches shake 
Their perfume into dewy glooms. 
And burden silvery spider looms 
And fill my paths with fragrant snow, 
Oh ! then the feet of men shall go 
Slowly amid my gold and green 
As though in silent, sacred rooms 
Where ghosts of long-dead saints are seen. 

And, softly, when the day is dead 
And flowers that love the dusk unfold. 
Softly, oh, softly, feet shall tread 
That leave no imprint in the mold ; 
Nor blade of grass, nor leaf, shall hold 
Their dainty trace of shaken dew, 
But a strange fragrance, rich and new. 
Shall slowly flow through shadows deep 
Until the lips of night are cold 
And dim things tremble into sleep. 



77 



